Jack and Arthur Shepard

Jack's story

John Wesley Barter Shepard 1880 – 1923(Great uncle)

"There are only two entries in an old family Bible and one of them shows John’s full names as John Wesley Barter Shepard, born 04.04.1880 at Winterborne Herringstone. I believe he was known in the family as Jack. I have found his name in the GRO Birth Index between Apr/Jun 1880 but have not obtained a Certificate. He married Cis ? and they had five children - Evelyn (1907), Arthur (1911), Beryl (1913), Hugh (who lived only 18 months), Frederick (1915) and Sybil (1917).... Evelyn (Evie) lived in Bournemouth. Her father John died on 12.12.1922 but her mother Cis was still alive in 1951 when she sent a wreath to her brother-in-law’s (Reginald Shepard) funeral. ... I can only assume that ‘Cis’ was a family nickname for John’s wife ... most of the children’s birth records show their mother’s maiden name as Barnes. ..."

Initially my investigations pointed me toward the parents of John’s wife, Annie Barnes living in Wareham but subsequent contact with another researcher has identified that I had selected the wrong family. The Annie Barnes from Wareham is in fact Annie Flora May Barnes who married Frederick Beames in Christchurch in 1907 using the maiden name Annie Flora May according to the BMD records. It is possible that the two Barnes families come from the same ancestors....

In 1891 the Barnes family we are interested in I believe are living in Bere Regis where Annie appears as Frances Barnes age 4.

Ten years later in 1901 she is shown as Annie Barnes.

The 1911 census shows that John and Annie had by that time had 4 children of whom only two were still alive. The other two children were stillborn.

John Wesley B Shepard died age 43 in Wareham Q4 1923 vol 5a page 292

Arthur's story

Marmaduke Arthur Shepard 1881 – ????(Great uncle)

"...The other entry in the Bible shows his full names as Marmaduke Arthur and that he was born on 02.05.1881 at Winterborne Herringston. .... Auntie Doreen says that Uncle Arthur visited them from time to time and she believes he ran a Pub in Hampshire or North Dorset. Evie says he died at Bury St. Edmunds and had no children..."

"... On the death of his brother Reginald in 1951 Arthur attended his funeral with his wife Vi....".

Census record for 1891 is shown under Reginald James Watts Shepard 1886 – 1951 . In 1901 the Wales census shows an entry for Arthur Shepard

Edwin Swaffield the Station Master with whom Arthur was lodging was also born in Dorchester and in 1871 was living with his parents in Bradford Peverell. One of the Swaffield children at that time was Sarah A who was later to marry Amos Shepard. Edwin appears to have moved to Swansea between 1871 and 1877 when he married Annie Morgan Q2 1877 vol 11a page 743. In 1911 Arthur Shepard is back in Dorset and staying with Amos Shepard in Stratton.

There is a marriage entry for a Marmaduke A Shepard to a Mary V Horne in Bury St Edmunds Q3 1921 vol 4a page 2333 As Arthur would have been 30 when he married there is time for him to have been working in Hampshire or North Dorset before moving to Bury St Edmunds although I cannot find him in the 1901 census. In 1901 there is a census entry for Bury St Edmunds which shows a Mary Horne who is a servant and could be Mary V Horne.

In 1891 Mary was living at home aged 10 in Fornham All SaintsI have discovered that Arthur served in the army during the First World War and appears to have been the only one of my ancestors to have done so. My paternal grandfather was in the Royal Navy throughout the conflict but there seem to be very few members of either the maternal or paternal lines who undertook military service at that time. I have located the Attestation record for Arthur Marmaduke Shepard which is shown below. This indicates that he had previously served with the Dorset Yeomanry for a period of three years. At the time of his joining up in April 1916 he would have been 35 years old. I have not been able to locate any record of his previous military service. I would have expected him to have rejoined a Dorset Regiment but the records are somewhat confusing. They indicate that the corps he joined was the Labour Corps of the Somerset L I (Light Infantry) but this handwritten entry has been struck through and apparently substituted with a stamp of 'DUKE OF CORNWALL' which is also an infantry regiment. It is possible that anyone joining at this stage in the war might not have been able to join their local Regiment but had to 'make do' with the nearest to their home which would explain the Somerset connection. Perhaps no vacanies actually existed in that Regiment either and he finally had to enrol in a Cornish regiment. It is also possible that enrolment into a Labour Corps was not actually a part of a Regiment but was just an attachment to a Regiment which possibly changed over time. This could also explain why in another document, his medal record, it shows that he achieved the rank of Corporal in the Devon Regiment Labour Corps and was awarded two of the three First World War Medals,The British War Medal and the Victory Medal. The entitlement to each of these is as shown below.British War Medal 1914-1920, authorised in 1919, was awarded to eligible service personnel and civilians. Qualification for the award varied slightly according to service. The basic requirement for army personnel and civilians was that they either entered a theatre of war, or rendered approved service overseas between 5 August 1914 and 11 November 1918. Service in Russia in 1919 and 1920 also qualified for the award. The Victory Medal 1914-1919 was also authorised in 1919 and was awarded to all eligible personnel who served on the establishment of a unit in an operational theatre.Further research has uncovered the following explanation regarding the Labour Corps.

The Labour Corps of 1917-1918BackgroundAlthough the army in France and Flanders was able to use some railways, steam engines and tracked vehicles for haulage, the immense effort of building and maintaining the huge network of roads, railways, canals, buildings, camps, stores, dumps, telegraph and telephone systems, etc, and also for moving stores, relied on horse, mule and human. In the Middle Eastern theatres, camels were also also used. In August 1914 there was no formed body of troops specifically designed for these tasks. In the infantry, manual work near the front lines was carried out by the Pioneer Battalions which were added to each Division. Some infantry regiments formed labour companies and works battalions for work on the lines of communication and at home, but the organisation of manpower was haphazard until the formation of the Labour Corps. The labour units expanded hugely and became increasingly well-organised. However, despite adding large numbers of men from India, Egypt, China and elsewhere, there was never enough manpower to do all the labouring work required. The total number of men engaged on work in France and Flanders alone approximated 700,000 at the end of the war, and this was in the labour units alone. In many cases the men of the infantry, artillery and other arms were forced to give up time to hard effort when perhaps training or rest might have been a more effective option.According to the Official History: "..although some labour units were raised and eventually labourers from various parts of the Empire and China were brought to France, the numbers were never at any period sufficient for the demands of a great army operating in a friendly country". The Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry12th (Labour) Battalion

Formed in Plymouth in April 1916 and moved to France as Army Troops to Fourth Army.April 1917 : became 156th and 157th Companies of the Labour Corps.In view of this it is probable that Arthur was initially going to the Somerset Light Infantry but with the formation of the 12th Battalion of the DCLI in April 1916 he was relocated to this Battalion.